


Elena Gets Even

by ChocoboCowgirl



Category: Compilation of Final Fantasy VII
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-01
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:28:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23949883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChocoboCowgirl/pseuds/ChocoboCowgirl
Summary: It is only Elena's first week at Turk HQ, and Reno has already done a fine job of making her upset…
Comments: 1
Kudos: 13





	Elena Gets Even

Elena was at the copy machine with her back to the door when Tseng entered the office. She didn't look. She didn't have to to know it was him. The way the door opened so smoothly, not jerked open or slammed shut. The even cadenced footsteps on the polished tile, not too fast, but not too slow. His breathing so calm and quiet that it could barely be heard.

Please don't notice me. Please don't notice me, she chanted to herself. Elena never thought she'd wish to not be noticed by Tseng, but if there was ever day she wished to be invisible to him, it was today. Unfortunately for her, with the copier right next to Tseng's office, being unseen by him was unlikely. Still, she held her breath, trying to keep it under control.

“Good morning, Elena.”

“Good morning, sir,” she answered with a hoarse voice that was accompanied by a barely controlled sniffle. Maybe he would think she just had a cold.

She heard his footsteps stop. An uncomfortable silence filled her ears. She could feel his gaze on the back of her head and felt her face growing hotter.

“Is everything all right?” he asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

Elena kept her back to him and nodded emphatically, sending her short blonde hair bobbing. Don't look at him. Don't look at him.

“Elena, look at me.”

Taking a deep shuddering breath, she turned around and looked at him. She hugged a stack of papers to her chest like a shield. Her big chocolate colored eyes were red rimmed and swollen, and her nose was pink. Any makeup she had had on was long washed off by now. She looked like a bedraggled kitten.

“Is everything all right?” Tseng asked again, a small wrinkle creasing his usually smooth forehead.

Elena's mind grasped for words. Why did he make her turn around? She couldn't lie to Tseng, not when she was forced to look at those beautiful, impossibly dark eyes of his. They always had a hypnotic effect on her. Did he know this? And she wondered if he affected anyone else that way. So, try as she may, she couldn’t keep the truth from spilling out of her.

“Reno… he said some things,” she hated herself even as she said it. “But it’s nothing,” she added quickly, wiping her nose on the back of her hand and sending her eyes to look elsewhere, anywhere but at the dark mesmerizing pools of Tseng’s eyes.

“It doesn't sound like nothing,” Tseng insisted.

“No, really. It's fine, don't worry about it.” Elena sucked in a steady breath and started to leave, doing her best to brush past him without bumping him.

“Elena. My office. Now.” Tseng ordered, his tone leaving little room for protest.

Elena felt her stomach drop. Suppressing a whimper, she obediently turned and followed Tseng to his office. He held the door open for her and ushered her in ahead of him, his hand barely touching the small of her back. Elena stopped in the center of the spacious office and heard him close the door behind her with a soft click. He stepped around her and directed her to an empty seat opposite him as he assumed his position behind the wide imposing desk. As he leaned back in his chair, she couldn't help but notice that he looked disappointed.

Elena sat on the edge of her seat, her back perfectly straight. She crossed her ankles first to one side then the other and nervously thumbed the edges of the stack of papers she had carried in with her from the copier. Even as she did all this, Tseng said nothing. Why didn't he say anything? Maybe she was supposed to go first? She'd never been in trouble before.

“I'm sorry, sir!” she finally blurted, “I know I should toughen up, and it was probably just part of breaking me in for the job, but he–”

Tseng held a hand up to stop her. “I don't need details.”

“Oh.” Elena's countenance fell.

“And, no. Whatever Reno did, it is not part of 'breaking you in'.” Tseng leaned forward and folded his hands on his desk. He took a deep breath. “Truth is: Reno is an ass.”

“…Sir?”

“What I'm trying to say is this: If you want to get even, I'll look the other way.”

Was this a test? There was a gleam in the depths of Tseng's eyes that she couldn't quite decipher. “Do you mean it, sir?” she asked hesitantly, daring to hope.

“Reno should know better than to make a woman cry,” he said, reaching across the broad desk to pass her a tissue, “Teach him a lesson for me.”

Elena gladly took the tissue and dabbed at her eyes. “What do you want me to do?” she asked.

“You're a Turk, so figure it out. Consider this your first assignment. Try to impress me.” Then Tseng smiled at her; a devilish smile that was beautiful in a cold, mischievous sort of way. 

“Yes, Sir!” Elena smiled back as she popped up from her chair, feeling quite rejuvenated by the turn of events. She headed for the door.

“Elena?” She looked back. “You can call me Tseng. Everyone else does.”

“Yes, sir!”

-

The next day…  
Following his usual routine of slouching into the office at the last possible second, Reno slammed down into his chair, ready for work. Then it happened. The chair broke. Well, it didn't so much break as it just came apart, due to the fact that a couple of vital screws had somehow been removed. However it happened, the result was the same: Reno was on the floor.

A long string of expletives exploded from his mouth before he even hit the ground and continued to flow for several breaths afterward. Half of his rear end had been saved by the seat cushion hitting the floor before he did; the other half took the brunt of his fall as it made contact with the hard tile floor. Somehow during the fall, his feet had ended up in the air, and one heel got caught on the edge of the desk. Gathering his wits, he yanked his foot down and grabbed hold of the edge of the desk to pull himself up.

On the other side of the office, Rude sat hunched over at his desk, a fist pressed to his lips as he choked back a laugh that desperately wanted to be set free.

“What the hell, man? You do this?” Reno shot an accusatory glare in his partner's direction.

Rude lost it then and pounded a fist on his desk as he tried to mouth the word “no” but all that came out was an explosion of laughter not unlike the sound of an angry warthog. He leaned back in his chair, threatening to spill himself onto the floor as well as he wrapped both arms tightly around his ribs in an effort to contain himself.

“Laugh it up,” Reno said, “I hope you choke on it.”

“It really wasn't me,” Rude sputtered, finally getting himself under control.

Having pulled himself off the floor, Reno kicked the wheeled portion of his chair – which happened to still be upright – sending it sliding across the room where it crashed into a wall and finally tipped over. He gave the decapitated seat a swift kick too, sending it smashing into the front of Rude's desk with a loud crash.

“Where's Elena?” he asked, glancing around the office with narrowed eyes as he stalked towards her desk.

“Haven't – Haven't seen her,” Rude gasped out, as his laughter threatened to resurface.

Reno grabbed the back of her chair and jerked it out from under her desk before dragging it back towards his own.

-

Elena stood doubled over with one hand clapped over her mouth in front of the one-way glass window that separated Tseng's private office from the rest of the office space.

“Coffee?”

Tseng stood at her left elbow holding out a steaming white ceramic mug towards her. She couldn’t understand how he was able to keep a straight face. Maybe he hadn't seen it.

“Oh, yes. Thank you,” Elena gladly accepted the offering and took a sip. It was black and bitter, but she wasn't about to complain.

Tseng stepped up to the window next to her. He crossed his arms and took a long gulp from his own mug. 

Together they watched Reno shove her chair in front of his desk and flop down in it. Grabbing the front edge of the desk, he pulled himself up to it. And immediately rammed both knees into the pencil drawer under the center of his desk.

“Dammit!” he howled as he bounced off, rubbing both knees briskly.

With a growl, he reached under the seat for the lever and quickly dropped the height of the chair to a more normal level.

“Damn short people. Always have their seats up so damn high,” he grumbled.

Across the room, Rude burst out in another fit of laughter.

From inside Tseng's office, they couldn't hear Reno's mumbling, but his body language – as well as Rude's – was unmistakable.

“I didn't even plan that one,” Elena chortled. “That was a bonus!”

Tseng nearly spilled his coffee.

-

Pulling himself up proper to his desk this time, Reno placed both elbows down on its wooden surface and propped his head up in his hands.

“Rude. Coffee,” he muttered, rubbing a hand over his face.

Rude mumbled something in protest as he got up obediently from his seat.

“What's that?” asked Reno.

“Nothing.” Rude barely kept a straight face as he headed for the coffee pot in the lounge.

Getting back on his usual routine, Reno pulled open the lowest drawer and took out a plastic tray of hygiene products. He never woke up early enough to get completely ready for work at home, so he usually finished up at his desk. A strand of red hair flopped over the top of his goggles and tickled against the tip of his nose. He blew it away as he snatched up a black bottle of hair gel from the tray. Mechanically, he went through his daily routine of pulling out the rubber band holding back his long ponytail and resetting it tighter. Next he took off the goggles he always wore strapped across the crown of his head and laid them in the center of his desk next to the tray. With a groan, he closed his eyes and shook his head like a dog shaking off water, sending pointed crimson shafts of hair falling every which way across his face. Flipping open the lid of the hair gel, he squeezed a moderate amount into his hands and rubbed them together before pushing them back through his fiery mane. He spread his fingers and combed them back through his hair several times to get all the product off his hands.

By now, Rude was returning with his coffee order. He approached Reno's desk and held the styrofoam cup out to him. When Reno turned to reach for it, Rude nearly spilled it on him.

“What's your problem?” Reno asked, hand upraised for the cup of wake-up juice he so desperately needed. “You still laughing about that? How old are you? Four?”

That's when Reno noticed his hand, and, more importantly, what was on it.

“No! Nononononono!” he wailed, his eyes growing wide at the sight of a thousand specks of purple glitter stuck to his fingers. Snatching up the bottle of hair gel, he bolted from his chair and made a mad dash for the men's room.

-

Meanwhile in Tseng's office…  
Tseng sputtered into his mug of coffee as Reno finished running his fingers through his hair and leaned back in his chair, eyes closed and taking a deep breath in through his nose. The fluorescent light above his desk reflected off every sprite of shimmering purple plastered throughout each shaft of hair pushed back from his forehead. Beside him, Elena was clinging to his arm as her knees buckled from laughing so hard and trying to hold it in.

“No! Nononononono!” Reno's muted wail reached them behind the glass as he bolted from the office. Suddenly, Elena was thrusting her still full coffee mug into Tseng's hands. Shuffling his own cup to his left hand, he barely caught hers before she let go of it and spun towards the door. Before he could say anything, she was out the door.

-

Rude had collapsed into Reno's abandoned seat, still holding the styrofoam cup of coffee in his hands, his hitching shoulders threatening to spill it with every jerk and twitch. He looked up and saw Elena emerge from Tseng's office and book it towards him. She held a finger to her pursed lips, telling him to be quiet. She skittered to a stop in front of Reno's desk and reached over the clutter of his work space to snatch up the goggles he had left behind. Her eyes shot up to Rude. Behind his glasses, she could see him smiling and give her a nod of permission to continue. She silently mouthed the words “thank you” as she procured the prized headgear.

Turning them over in her hand, she quickly pulled two small pieces of black paper from her pocket and held them up against the tinted lenses. They were cut in nearly perfect ovals to match the shape of the eyepieces. She whipped off two pieces of tape from the dispenser on Reno’s desk, rolled them flat and adhered a piece of paper to each lens. Turning the finished product towards Rude, she flashed him a schoolgirl smile and returned the goggles to the center of his desk, lenses down, then bolted out of the office.

A few minutes later, Reno returned looking like a drowned rat and still sporting a few stubborn flecks of glitter. He gave Rude a death stare and a hitchhiker’s thumb. “Beat it,” he ordered. 

Rude set the coffee cup on the desk next to the goggles and returned to his own desk. With a huff, Reno sat back down and snatched up his headgear. Without looking, he slipped the elastic band over his head and settled the eye pieces into their usual position over his forehead. An occasional snicker floated to him from Rude’s direction every few minutes, but he was determined to ignore him.

Tseng soon emerged from his office and headed for the elevators. He had a meeting at nine with the President. He slowed as he passed Reno's desk. The redhead's hair was still damp and laid flatter to his head than usual. A few sparkles of glitter were still scattered throughout the wet strands. His goggles were stationed in their usual position at his hairline, although they looked odd without their usual covering of stray hairs spilling over the top of them. As he felt Tseng's gaze pass over him, Reno's icy blue eyes glanced up at him only briefly before returning to his computer screen. A nearly completed game of Minesweeper filled his monitor.

“Watcha lookin' at, Boss?” he grumbled, daring Tseng to say something about his hair, or the fact that he wasn't working.

Tseng came to a pause and hovered at Reno's shoulder for just a second or two. “I wouldn't click on that one,” he said, a wry smile lifting his lips as he patted Reno roughly on the shoulder and continued on his way.

Ignoring the advice, Reno clicked the block anyway. A small explosion set off a chain reaction of every mine in the game, accompanied by a Game Over announcement. He didn't dare throw his usual tantrum with Tseng still in the office.

“Since you're done with your game, you can get to work on this.” 

Reno looked over his shoulder at Tseng and saw him tapping a running to-do list they kept on the bulletin board by the door. With a huff, Reno got up and ripped the list off the board as Tseng left the office. Pick up reports from archives. Deliver incident report to HR. Replace burned out light in hallway. Restock office supplies. Take shreds to incinerator...

-

A little after eleven, Elena came skipping into the office, looking as peppy as ever. Reno wanted to gag.

“Good morning, Rude!” she quipped cheerfully.

“Elena,” he returned in as steady a voice as he could muster. He didn't look at her. He didn't dare or risk cracking up again.

“Well, look who’s late. Where you been?” Reno sneered from his desk, turning to cast her a nasty side-eye glance. Rising from his chair, he crossed his arms and leaned a hip against his desk, watching her every move. He looked like a parent ready to scold a child for missing curfew, which was rather ironic coming from Reno.

“I am not late,” Elena retorted, setting a small package down on her desk. “I was running some errands for Tse-” Her eyes went wide as she looked at Reno. One hand covered her mouth and the other she pressed against her chest. “Oh, Reno!” Running from her desk to his, she slammed into him, wrapping her arms tightly around his middle in the most unexpected bear hug. “That is the cutest almost-apology I’ve ever seen! I love you, too!”

“Wha-”

When she pulled away from him, she reached up and put a hand on either side of his face and pulled him towards her. “Let me look at you!” she exclaimed, standing on tip toe to admire him. “Ooh! I want a picture!” she said releasing him and digging her phone out of her back pocket. She held it out towards Rude. “Rude, did you see what Reno did! Take a picture for me!”

“Whoa, whoa! Hold on!” Reno protested as Elena threw her arms around his neck and snuggled up close to him, cheek-to-cheek.

“Thanks, Rude!” Elena released a dumbfounded Reno, gave him a quick peck on the cheek, and took her phone back from Rude. She hurried towards Tseng’s office. “Wait till I show, Tseng!” she said a little too animatedly as she skipped off.

Reno stood slack jawed, watching her go. “What the hell was that about?” he finally exploded, reaching up to rub Elena’s makeup off his cheek.

Rude raised an eyebrow and silently tapped two fingers against his forehead. Taking the hint, Reno reached up and snatched the goggles off his head and looked at them. There were two round pieces of paper taped over his lenses, one reading “I (heart)” and the other “Elena”. 

“I didn’t do this!” Reno whined. “How long have they been like this?! Rude?”

Rude shrugged.

“You do to know!” Reno accused, as he set into ripping the paper off.

“Since this morning,” Rude admitted.

“And you didn’t say anything?! I’ve been all over this building today! Do you know how many people saw me like this?”

Rude shrugged again.

Tseng's office door opened and he walked out.

“You didn’t say anything either!” Reno shouted as Tseng made his way to the supply closet. “You looked right at me this morning and didn’t say a word! What gives?”

Tseng just shrugged. “Maybe next time you’ll know better than to make a woman cry.”

-

The next day, Elena got to the office early. A vase of white roses sat on the center of her desk. The morning sunlight coming in through the window cast a rainbow across her desk as it passed through the water-filled glass vase. What was this? She looked quickly around the room. The light was on in Tseng's office. Were these from him? A card stood up in the center of the bouquet, and she snatched it up, her pulse quickening. Inside were written only three words, and she couldn’t help but smile as she read them:

"You're all right" -R


End file.
